


Catechism

by grasssea



Category: Lucifer (TV)
Genre: Children Are Hard, Gen, Having Maze Around Doesn't Make Them Easier, Religion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-27
Updated: 2016-06-27
Packaged: 2018-07-18 12:38:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,005
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7315516
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grasssea/pseuds/grasssea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Dan comes from a good Catholic family, Lucifer and Maze are not good Catholics, and Trixie gets caught in the crossfire. That age old conundrum of religious education gets more complicated when the Devil is a family friend.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Catechism

**Author's Note:**

> Trying to be respectful since I'm not Catholic and didn't grow up Catholic but this is from Chloe's perspective and she's a bit iffy on faith, still, I wanted to leave it open ended. It was just too interesting of a topic to ignore, since Trixie clearly knows who the devil is but her parents don't seem very religious.

Dan had really been understanding about it, but his aunt hadn’t. Mrs. Espinoza was a loving and gentle woman ninety percent of the time, the other ten percent of the time, no one crossed her. Not even Chloe. Not even when the subject was Trixie’s religious education.

“I can tell her no.” Dan offered for the millionth time.

Chloe shook her head. “No. She’s right. We might not be religious, but it is important to your family. Besides, she’s just asking if she can take Trixie to church with her a few times over the summer and sign her up for a communion course. She is taking care of her for a month.”

It always hurt Chloe to admit defeat, a physical ache in her throat. But karate camp only ran so long, and Trixie was banned from the local summer program after her hijinks last year. They needed to send her down to the Mrs. Espinoza’s, at least for August, or they would both lose what jobs they had left.

She was starting to wish she taken her mother up on that offer of a nanny.

Chloe had been raised in the church of Common Sense by her dad and the holy order of Ridiculous Showbiz Superstition by her mom. There had been a few stops by the local Episcopalian congregation for holidays and when her grandparents visited. Other than that Chloe had been left to form her own belief system, or not, as she chose. She liked church, had attended a few times as a rookie when blood was still new to her and violence still shocked her soul, but there wasn’t time for it in her schedule.

Dan had attended Mass every week until he was sixteen, carefully escorted by his stern aunt, devout mother, and gentle father, but hadn’t kept it up when he had entered the LAPD. He had nothing against it, he’d mutter a few Hail Mary’s when the car wouldn’t start and kept a rosary in the bottom drawer of his desk, but he would occasionally confide that he felt he’d overdosed in childhood and was still recovering from it.

Between the two of them and their hectic work life, Trixie had been raised with a vague idea that right was right and wrong was wrong and maybe there was someone up there watching them-like Santa Claus but more divine. The one exception was yearly visits to her great aunt’s house.

Pamela Espinoza had watched her sister in law do undercover work in San Diego during the eighties, when female police officers were starting to really earn respect. She’d helped raise her nephew whose parents could be gone for days at a time, had visited hospital rooms and kept secrets. When Dan’s parents had died she’d been his closest family north of Arizona, where his sisters had settled.

She was kind and loving and determined Trixie would grow up Catholic. It was on her orders that they’d had her baptized, and on her orders that Trixie would be spending part of the summer learning…. Chloe wasn’t actually sure. She should probably figure that out at some point.

“I just don’t want Trixie to feel smothered.” Dan said. “I did as a kid, and look how I turned out. Mass skipper of the year.”

Chloe reached for a compromise. “How about we let Trixie take the class, tell her to keep an open mind, and at the end if she wants to be confirmed she can be. Even your aunt can’t argue with that. We don’t want to be confirming any non believers, and I definitely don’t think we fit the Mass requirements.”

“But she can get angry if Trixie turns out to be a little atheist despite her best efforts.” Dan said, burying his face in his hands. “And she’ll probably blame me.” he added, his voice a little muffled.

Chloe nudged him, some of the playfulness from before their marriage had collapsed creeping back into her voice despite her best efforts. “Please. I’m the godless blonde from Hollywood. It’s definitely my fault. Besides, she might like being Catholic.”

Dan raised his head and his eyebrows. “She thinks her mom works with the devil.” he pointed out. “There’s no way letting her near a religious text is going to end well in anyway.”

It was a legitimate line of argument. Speaking of Lucifer…..

 

 

“I thought you were smarter than this.” the devil moaned to the ceiling. Unlike most of his moans, this one wasn’t of the sexual nature. It was decidedly… disappointed.

Chloe would be damned before she let a hedonist with delusions of demonhood criticize her parenting.

“We want Trixie to have a balanced education and we want her to be connected to her family. It’s just a class. Pamela says it’s almost like a summer camp. And we have her promise she’ll let Trixie ask lots of questions and figure it out on her own.”

“No, no, no.” Lucifer shook his head like a waterlogged dog. “You don’t understand. All that scripture, all that history it’s all very-”

“Silly?” Chloe suggested, since it was her own uncharitable first opinion.

“Unflattering.” Lucifer said. “Like I would go around tempting a bunch of sanctimonious killjoys. That’s no fun. Better to enjoy the humans who know how to have a good time rather than wasting time on prophets and saints. Sure, I might have gone for a few of them, but only for the challenge. I wasn’t quite as desperate as they make me out to be. And the imagery! Snakes? How passe.”

“Oh, my god.” Chloe said.

“Yes, quite.” Lucifer agreed sulkily.

“This is another part of your fantasy world and I’m not going to stand for it. Trixie is eight years old. She’s going to go have a nice month with her aunt, attend a class about the bible with a bunch of other eight year olds and pester an elderly nun with questions. She’ll come home and have a richer life experience for it.” Chloe folded her arms. “And that is final.”

“You are going to ruin a perfectly good child.” Lucifer warned her as she walked out. “And on your head so be it!”

Maze was waiting downstairs on a barstool, chewing on something thoughtfully. Chloe sighed.

“Do you have a rant for me about the evils of religion as well?”

“Nah.” Maze picked a bit of- was that bone?- something out of her mouth. “It’s your choice, and your daughter’s. Just tell her I have her back.”

 

 

A week after her aunt drove her down to San Diego, Trixie Decker vanished.

According to the nice lady helping out with the confirmees, she had arrived on time and then had been taken out of class shortly afterwards by a dark skinned woman who claimed to be a neighbour. They had let her go in part because no one wanted to deal with more of her in class rabble rousing.

People really needed to be better about not letting strangers, no matter what badges they had or how many hugs they were getting, wander off with children. Malcolm had been bad enough.

Chloe hung up the phone, told Dan to calm down his aunt, and dialled Maze.

“Hello?” a beautiful voice snapped from the speakers.

“Hi.” Chloe said, trying to keep herself from shouting. “Detective Decker here. I think you have my daughter.”

“Small, dark hair, bored out of her mind?” Maze asked. “Yes, right here. Kid, talk to your mom.”

Chloe could feel herself turning red but it all went away when she heard Trixie’s voice.

“Hi, mommy.”

Then it came back.

“Beatrice Decker! What were you thinking? Everyone is so worried about you, you nearly gave your aunt a heart attack. Daddy is talking to her right now and she’s very upset. What did you do?”

She could hear Trixie shifting nervously and the little voice on the other end of the line was guilty. “I didn’t like the class and I didn’t want to disappoint Auntie Pam. So I called Maze and she came to pick me up. I was supposed to be back before the class ended, but we got stuck in traffic.”

“Big car crash.” Maze confirmed. “We’ve been at a standstill for thirty minutes.”

“You’re lucky the entire police force isn’t looking for you!” Chloe said in a slightly calmer voice. She didn’t want to upset Trixie after all. “How did Maze even get down there?”

“I had an open schedule and a fast car.” Maze said, and her shrug was almost audible. “Besides, Lucifer had some business down here to take care of.”

“I don’t want to know.” Chloe said, pressing the back of her hand to her forehead and praying Maze had the common sense not to bring Trixie along on “business”.

Dan raised an eyebrow. Chloe placed a hand on the speaker so she could debrief him, then returned to Maze and Trixie.

“Maze, Pam is still at the church. Drop Trixie off there as soon as you can without breaking any speed limits then find someplace to hide before she tracks you down. Trixie, I will talk to you more later. Just know for now that I am very disappointed in you.” She should be apoplectic, but instead she was just relieved. Trixie was with Maze and both of them were nearby. No mad cops or kidnappers, just one impulsive seven year old and one ninja with no sense of boundaries. It had all been sorted out quickly and they hadn’t had to call the San Diego police.

“Sorry, mommy.” Trixie said again. There was a sniffle in there too for good measure. “I just kind of thought it was dumb, and no one would listen to me. I didn't even tell them about Lucifer!” she said, aggrieved.

“You can think whatever you want, sweetheart.” Chloe told her. “And if you really hate it, I’ll tell Auntie Pam to take you out.” Who knew how Pamela would take that, if she even agreed to keep Trixie for the rest of the month. A responsible parent would have driven right down and scooped Trixie up but Chloe and Dan had jobs to think of. “But for now, think of it as listening school. You just have to listen really hard. Besides, I heard at the end of the class they have cookies.”

Pam had mentioned something about that, hadn’t she? If not Chloe trusted the power of Pamela Espinoza to make cookies happen.

“Really?” Trixie asked, a little perkier, her supposed guilt forgotten. “I guess that’s okay.”

“Okay.” Chloe confirmed and glanced at the clock. “I have to go now. Say hi to daddy.”

She held out the phone so Dan, still reassuring Pamela in Spanish, could hear Trixie’s dutiful “Hi, Daddy.”

“I still have another half of a shift.” she told Dan. “And I’m supposed to be in forensics right now. Can you hold down the fort? Keep Pamela calm and talk to Trixie once she’s back in safe hands?”

Dan nodded. He didn’t even need to look judgemental for Chloe to feel responsible. Her delusional partner, her delusional partner’s chaotic evil bartender, her fault.

“We need to have a long talk with Trixie, and then I’ll have a long talk with Maze.” she promised.

Dan sighed and pressed his phone into his shoulder so Pam couldn’t hear. “Is it bad that I’m relieved?” he asked.

Chloe shook her head. She was too. It might have been a dire miscommunication, but Maze was practically a responsible adult at this point.

“No. We should have expected this.”

Maybe Trixie wasn’t in exactly the right family to be dealing with organized religion. But since her favorite babysitter was a self proclaimed demon, it was only fair the other side got a chance at the batting mound.

Besides, Pam seemed to be recovering from the shock. If anyone could make Trixie take to religion it would be her.

Chloe smiled at the idea. Lucifer would have a heart attack.


End file.
